Jana Machatova
Jeweller
Published: 03.11.2022
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Statement
Jana Machatova is one of the first Slovak fine artists who completed the study of jewelry at the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Bratislava (under Cepka and Weisslechner). During her time there, she underwent a geometrizing and kinetic episode under Cepka’s influence; however, she soon shifted her attention to the theme of memory. She works on this theme in mutually interconnected layers – through her own story, touched up by retrospective optimism and through commentaries, which provide a bitter (or) realistic crown on sweet childhood times. Thus, the accent on personal, family or fantasy memory traces developed in the form of medallions in laminated photography or in carved silver sheets alternates by tuning in to a wider context. In her jewelry, Socialist Czechoslovakia marches with various attributes – badges of children’s pioneer organizations, prefabricated housing developments, barbed wire. Party leaders kissing, Spartakiad games, happy workers and merry children are a more telling description of the socialist era – in the sense of the artist’s sentimental-ironic poetics, they are frequently accompanied by a luxurious golden background and bucolic blueprint motifs. Another layer, to which she revisits with intermissions, is connected to the narrative provided by old postcards and newspapers, in her latest series focusing on, but not exclusively, the history of women’s crafts./ Viera Kleinova, 2019
About series Frauen-Fleiss
I am flicking through a tattered newspaper from 1909 and thinking of the woman who kept the supplement with instructions for needlework in a black folder in an old cabinet in the attic. She redrew the monogram designs and embroidery patterns in ink on translucent paper and included them in the scrapbook collection. I can imagine her sitting by the window, by our small window, embroidering her daughter’s trousseau or knitting baby slippers. I am thinking of the unknown woman who embroidered beautiful pictures, and yet she had no idea what horrors of the twentieth century awaited her. I am thinking of her and wishing her that the moment of peace and concentrated work on something nice would last as long as possible. At the same time, I feel an unusual affinity with her. I pour epoxy resin on the newspaper, trying to preserve the memory. It becomes translucent, but the contours remain, and the patterns overlap...
We are vulnerable and our lives are never completely in our hands. There are often some resolutions about us that have been made by other people. And then we feel as if we were naked. Nobody can hear us shouting, our words. Our faces are invisible, our eyes are only voiceless screams….
/ Jana Machatova
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